Climate modification: Growing doubts over chip fat biofuel

21 April 2021

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New research questions the environmental impact of increasing imports of utilized cooking oil (UCO) into the UK and Europe.

Chip fat and other oils are considered waste, so when they are used to make biodiesel it saves carbon emissions by displacing fossil oil.

But such is the demand throughout Europe that imports now represent over half of the UCO that's made into fuel.

According to the study, external, there's no other way to prove these imports are sustainable.

With no testing of what's coming in, experts think it is likewise ripe for scams.

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Reducing emissions from transport is showing to be one of the most difficult challenges for federal governments all over the world.

They have actually encouraged making use of biofuels as an important means of curbing carbon from cars and trucks and lorries.

Biofuels are generally a blend of nonrenewable fuel source and oil made from plants or veggies.

The reality that these crops can be re-grown and absorb more CO2 indicates they counteract the carbon emitted when utilized in engines.

Soy and palm oil were as soon as extensively utilized as parts of biodiesel but this practice has been commonly rejected due to the fact that it motivates logging.

So for the last years approximately, using used cooking oil has actually expanded massively as an alternative feedstock for fuel.

Chip fat and other waste oils have actually ended up being an essential element of biodiesel with an efficient market springing up throughout Europe to gather and process the product.

But with the quantity of biodiesel made from UCO increasing by around 40% every year given that 2014, there just isn't sufficient chip fat to walk around.

According to a report from the project group Transport & Environment, external, over half of the UCO used in Europe is imported.

Their research study suggests this is extremely troublesome when it concerns effect on the .

While UCO is thought about a waste product in the UK, in China, Indonesia and Malaysia it has long been utilized to feed animals. The report raises the question of what individuals in these nations are changing the UCO with, when it is exported.

In 2019, Malaysia exported 90 million litres of UCO to the UK and Ireland. Figures for their exports to other European countries aren't available but the circulation of UCO is most likely to be comparable.

With a population of around 33 million, that's close to 3 litres per head of utilized oil that's collected and exported to the UK and Ireland alone.

By comparison, Thailand, which has a population of 70 million people, managed to collect around five million litres of UCO in 2019.

"Because we are purchasing it, they have actually less used cooking oil to utilize on the things that they were formerly using it for," stated Greg Archer with Transport & Environment.

"And they're just buying more virgin oil and that virgin oil is largely palm oil, because that's the least expensive oil offered.

"So indirectly, we're simply encouraging more logging in Southeast Asia."

Another major problem with UCO is the suspicion of scams.

Because of demand from Europe, the price of UCO is typically higher than palm oil. The concern is that some dishonest traders are merely watering down shipments of UCO with palm.

As oils of different types are mixed in bulk for transport, and no screening of the products is performed, some experts think fraud is swarming.

The idea of fraud anywhere along the chain of supply is turned down by the European Waste-to-Advanced Biofuels Association (EWABA), who say there are robust accreditation schemes in place.

"It is widely known that the European Commission has taken relevant actions to entirely curb unsound market practices in biofuel markets," stated Angel Alberdi, EWABA's secretary general.

He says a new database being developed by the EU will ensure that trading, certification and sustainability information on all bio-liquids will need to be signed up.

"The mix of revised accreditation plans and the pan-EU track and trace database will make sure that no sustainability problems occur in the entire biofuels and bio-liquids supply chain," he informed BBC News.

Others in the field are worried that the database concept, which was first mooted in 2018, might not work in stemming thought scams.

The report from Transport & Environment explains that with shipping and aviation aiming to decarbonise by utilizing biofuels, need for UCO might double over the next decade.

"Rising the demand beyond sustainable supply levels would increase these concerns, and threats of utilizing 'fake' UCO, possibly leading to indirect impacts such as logging."

Follow Matt on Twitter @mattmcgrathbbc, external.

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